Consent in Gaming - Free Guidebook

[Zardnaar]

Al-Qadim a setting I loved had slavery in it as just part of the culture. It doesn't make it right. It was just culturally acceptable in that setting.

No mines about Game of Thrones level I suppose but without sexposition.

Brothels exist, slavery exists, undead and dragons exist, bad things happen to good people.

 

[pogre]

If I were running a Call of Cthulhu game at a Con or something similar this would be a decent resource. It's cool that it's free. There is certainly nothing wrong with being sensitive to these issues.

I play with friends and my sons in my home games and we don't delve into those kind of topics. At most, they occur off-screen.

 

[S'mon]

It’s hard not to face-palm when you see people falling foul of Popper’s Parodox in 2019. Especially on a site which has paraphrased it in its rules for over decade.

That's quite the non-sequitur! The young woman acting out her dark fantasies at my table wasn't being intolerant of anyone - I was being 'intolerant' of her violating the table social contract. Likewise the young man her boyfriend with his dice cheating - he was not showing intolerance, I was. Though probably not intolerant enough.

 

[S'mon]

Popper argues that with respect to those that wish to silence debate...

"In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies ; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be most unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force ; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument ; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal."

In other words, Popper argues that to protect the right of people to speak freely from those that would silence debate, we may have to take steps to silence those that are silencing debate.

I like how the Intolerant use Popper's very reasonable approach as justification to silence any speech they don't like, by labelling it Intolerance.

 

[S'mon]

Racism and sexism, is generally what the signs on public buildings mean.

You don't get Safe Space signs in English pubs. At least not yet!

Edit: OK my pub does have a sign:
This is a Community Pub
Mind Your Language

 

[Arnwolf666]

I like how the Intolerant use Popper's very reasonable approach as justification to silence any speech they don't like, by labelling it Intolerance.

I don’t mind them labeling it intolerant. I care when they don’t allow them to speak. Even intolerant people have a right to speak. I support hitler having the right to publicly call for the execution of Jews, as long as I am safely give my rebuttal argument and be heard.

 

[Wolfpack48]

Consent in Gaming - Monte Cook Games

Tackle Mature Content with Confidence! From fending off an attack by bloodthirsty pirates to delving into dank caverns, roleplaying games […]

www.montecookgames.com

Sean Reynolds and Shanna Germain have a free book on Monte Cook's site that is worth a look. It is a worthwhile read, whether you're in the camp that thinks it is going overboard or the camp that thinks that tools like this are desperately needed.

It's also available on Drivethru:

DriveThruRPG

www.drivethrurpg.com

 

[dragoner]

You don't get Safe Space signs in English pubs. At least not yet!

Edit: OK my pub does have a sign:
This is a Community Pub
Mind Your Language

You English, and your verbosity, you would think you own the language.

Truth is though, you do have sign in your pub.

 

[MNblockhead]

I don't think I've ever run a pregnant women baby sacrifice cult.

I would look at a DM wanting to run that a little bit sideways.

In a game with Illithids, Slaad, Succubi, dominate person spells, and official books detailing infernal and demonic cults, this isn't that far out for me. It depends on how it is run. I mean, look at that official lore on how hags procreate. Look into the description on how orcs increase their numbers.

That said, I would never dive into these scenarios at a convention or open-to-the-public game at a FLGS. I think games like this could be okay in such contexts, with proper warning in the game description, but even then, just because the group at your table may agree to it. Those on nearby tables may not appreciate overhearing it.

But even if I keep things very PG rated, you have people who are afraid of snakes and insects. I had a friend in high school, who, although he was a big imposing guy, got really creeped out about bugs. Like, when when you'd get these large numbers of box elder bugs swarming in the fall near doors, he couldn't go in or out of that door. He would also leave the room if insect swarms came up in a game. I've also worked in a museum of natural history and have seen on multiple occasions people physically recoil and freak out when they came across a snake exhibit.

Phobias are so personal, that it is very difficult to anticipate everyone that might come up when you open a game to a group of strangers. Short of listing every every type of creature and environment challenge that can come up in an encounter in the description of the game, I really don't know how these kinds of consent rules would work.

In a recent AL game there there was a flash flood challenge. At least a half hour was spend making saves and athletic checks to avoid drowning and saving party members who were drowning. What if one of the players almost drowned as a child and was afraid of water? What if someone had a loved one who drowned? As a DM, I WANT to be empathetic and help them enjoy the game.

If the affected player just touches and X, I suppose I could suss out that the entire flood scene is an issue. But I would prefer someone to just say, I'm not comfortable with a flooding/drowning scene rather than playing a guess-what-I'm-uncomfortable-with game. I find some of these "solutions" to the issue to be more awkward than what they are trying to solve.

But once I know what the issue is, sure, I can work around that. I can skip that scene. It may mean a shorter game and some of the other players may be disappointed, but I think most people would be sympathetic.

But what is someone joins an AL game and the adventure is underwater themed. The entire adventure involves infiltrating a sahuagin lair and overcoming them and their shark minions. Now, most of times I've showed up for AL games in my FLGS, I don't know what the adventure is going to be. So a person could easily join a came that will touch upon a phobia. In this specific sahuagin adventure, touching an X isn't going to help. Is the person afraid of water or sharks? Furthermore, let's say the person explains to the DM that they survived a shark attack and find describing attacks by sharks to be traumatic. Is that DM now supposed to scrap the adventure he or she prepared?

It really sucks for that person to have to walk away from the game, but in this situation, the content is not inappropriate for a general audience, including young adults or even older children. Nobody is singling out the individual. There is no bullying. It is just an unfortunate coincidence that the adventure content conflicts with that personal phobia/past trauma. Hopefully there is another game being run at that time the person can join in on--I'd certainly speak to the other DMs and try to find a spot for this person. But I don't expect a DM to scrap that adventure and have a back-up ready to go.

 

[S'mon]

What if someone had a loved one who drowned? As a DM, I WANT to be empathetic and help them enjoy the game.

Well I have this issue (some of my relatives drowned in a big ship disaster, the Zeebrugge sinking). I would tend to avoid 'Titanic' type scenarios. But I don't want to ruin the fun of others. If I found myself playing that and it got too much I'd recuse myself, not tell the GM to change the scenario.